Waking Too Early - Libertyville,IL

Some kids just have "early clocks". I would try putting him to bed ealier. If he isn't a great napper, he may actually sleep longer if you put him down earlier. My kids have never been super sleepers and when someone suggested this I thought they were nuts, but it really did work. Best of luck - like all stages, this will pass : )

We had trouble at the 8 month mark as well - there was teething plus pulling up and cruising around the crib to keep him busy. We decided to check diaper, give him a bottle (that he could give to himself) followed by it is still night time and tellig ours that it was time for night-night. Sometimes he would babble for 30-45 minutes and then fall asleep for another few hours. Other times he would babble a bit and then cry. If he cried longer than 5-10 min I would take him a baby cloth book - put the light on dimmly in his room and tell him he should read until he falls asleep. He loves to turn book pages and would do that. Most of the time it worked!

At 8 months though, he should definately be taking either 2 or even 3 naps. Here are some sleep schedules that might help you. They are spot on according to my pediatrician and they worked for us (baby #1 was a horrible sleeper until 22 months - #2 has been a dream but every once in awhile we have a bad 2-3 days).

http://www.babysleepsite.com/baby-sleep-feeding-schedules/

Good luck! C.

Maybe you can try eliminating a nap if he's taking two naps. My son sleeps for 12-13 hours at night and he's 18 months old. It seems like your son should be sleeping longer than that. Good luck!

My son was the same way. We finally started putting our focus on his naps and things turned around. Try to make a commitment to getting him a nap at a consistent time each day and that might help.

I started to have the same issue you are having at 8 months. Mines is 11 months and we have gotten him to sleep in till 5:15. Its horrible and I am hoping it passes soon. We put him to bed sometime around 7:00, I tried earlier and it didn't work. Just made me crazy cause I was putting him to bed when trying to make dinner for the rest of the family. My 11 month old is a horrible napper, will only nap at day care. I use the cry it out method and as I type this he is relapsing and wont fall asleep, been almost an hour.

Good luck

sounds like food allergies or reflux for sure. My kids are 6 and this happened to them, yep walked at 8 months. They cant sit still since the stomach from the food is irratating them hence why thye cant sleep either.

Sleep gets more sleep. Sounds counter-intuitive, but it's true. The less sleep a kid gets, the less they're going to sleep, which then just compounds an already sleep-deprived child.

I had one bad sleeper that I learned from so that my second was a better sleeper. Between 7-8 months, both had some bad stints for a month or so as teeth were coming in, rolling over got more fun, crawling started, etc.

At 8 months, my second child went to bed around 6pm. But that was after about 4 months of sleep-training to get her to be able to go to sleep that early and sleep until 6:30. My first kid wouldn't sleep through the night until he was about 1 yr old! And I currently watch my 9 month old niece daily and from the time she was 5 weeks old, I enforced consistent naptimes and wake times so that she would sleep right at night, which would then make for good daytime sleeping!

You could try to give him a not-full-bottle in the 4am dark (it's not unusual for an 8 month old to get hungry) and put him right back into bed when he's done. No talking, no nothing. Just functional. Then, at 8-months, he should be getting at least 2 naps a day with only about 1 1/2 hrs of wake time in between. I am adamant about this with my niece (and my sis is very thankful!). Once babies pass the overtired moment, it will be that much harder for them to fall asleep, especially for naps, and thus they get the "bad napper" tag.

I highly recommend Dr. Marc Weissbluth's book "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child". It saved my first child's sleep and helped me get the second on track early on so that I didn't need to do much, if any, cry-it-out with her. Greatest book ever!

Good luck and I hope you all get some much-needed rest!

(P.S. my first is still an earlier riser than the rest of us, but he's moved from 5am as a baby/toddler to now 6:30 as a kid, which is nicer on on all of us!)

My now 3 year old woke up between 4-4:30am for about 3 months around 15 months...We tried everything to have him sleep in and nothing worked! He just eventually started sleeping in more and more, he now finally sleeps in till about 6, 6:30 if were lucky. The only thing that we did so as to prevent having a crabby baby at 4am was to put him down by 5pm the latest, sometimes even by 4:30pm! His bedtime didn't allow us to do much during those months but at least he was a well rested baby...good luck and hang in there!

I agree to try an earlier bedtime - at least for awhile because he is probably over tired. ANY time my son gets into the habit of waking early we alwyas try earlier bedtime. I would try 6:15 maybe or so.

At 8 months old, he may still need fed at night when he wakes. But this should be only once, and even then should only last another month or so. What I would have done in your situation is at 4am when he wakes - go into his room and in as much darkness as possible change his diaper in his crib, feed him and put him back down. Little to no talking and put him back down if he's awake or asleep. No rocking to sleep. After that - go back to your room and let him cry it out and fall back asleep. I usually set a time to which I won't get my son whether he's awake or asleep so he doesn't learn to wake earlier and earlier for my company - usually it's 6:30am.

Also, make sure you are working on good sleep habits so that he knows HOW to put himself back to sleep at 4am. Starting with nap times :)